IBM fires 1,300 employees

International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), the world’s largest computer-services provider, has fired at least 1,300 workers in a round of US job cuts that began yesterday, according to the employee group Alliance@IBM.

The job reduction includes at least 222 people in marketing for the software business and 165 in semiconductor research and development, the Bloomberg Businessweekly reports, citing Lee Conrad, a coordinator for Alliance@IBM, which is affiliated with the Communications Workers of America union.

The move is part of a global restructuring plan that IBM announced in April after releasing disappointing first-quarter results. The cuts target employees with a range of seniority, from rank-and-file staff to executives, said a person familiar with the effort, who asked not to be named because the information is private. The restructuring will cost $1 billion worldwide, including severance expenses.

“Just about every division at every location is being impacted,” Conrad said.

The Armonk, New York-based company posted profit of $3 a share last quarter, missing the $3.05 predicted by analysts - the first earnings shortfall since 2005, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. IBM said at the time that the job reduction would be concentrated overseas and mostly complete by the end of June.

The company is said to be cutting 6,000 to 8,000 jobs globally, based on the $1 billion cost figure, said Laurence Balter, an analyst at Oracle Investment Research in Fox Island, Washington. That would represent less than 2 percent of IBM’s total workforce of 434,246 as of Dec. 31.